Prism floated out of Ambrose’s bag when he entered the dungeon with the first crate, only to watch as he immediately left. Once he had dragged in the crates he pulled them all open, searching through their contents and grabbing several of the smaller tools, before placing them in his bag. “I see you have brought new tools to the dungeon. Would you like to donate them?”
“Some of them I would, Prism. Everything that’s in the crates is for the dungeon but I want to hold on to everything in the bag and on my body for now thank you.”
The contents of the crates all vanished into thin air. Ambrose gathered the empty boxes as he headed towards the dungeon hotel.
----------------------------------------
YOU HAVE COMPLETED A DUNGEON QUEST
Goal: Earn enough dungeon contribution to afford the rewards provided, 500 DC.
Reward: Already received.
----------------------------------------
“Thank you Ambrose, with this I have been able to reactivate the Tailoring wing of the hotel, it will be ready for you by the time you arrive. I am sure you will be relieved to know that your room will now be furnished as well. If you wish, you can spend your contribution points to improve your room. Alternatively you could use them to source additional tools to repair the other crafting halls.”
The two spent the journey discussing what the other things Ambrose could use the dungeon contribution points for now that he could actually earn them. Normally the cubbies he had seen on the outer pathways of the dungeon hotel would be filled with rare loot, or things that other adventurers had crafted. Unfortunately nothing had survived the dungeons decay. When the adventurers went to war they took what they had crafted with them, then as the dungeon tried to maintain its size it had been forced to consume the various rare crafting items or Skill books it had had in its possession to survive.
The reason nothing had been furnished was because things that weren’t directly part of the dungeon were removed when the dungeon shrunk in size, and since the hotel had been inactive since the last downgrade, nothing had been made. Only now that there was an official Resident within the dungeon, and a crafting hall had been activated was the dungeon able to add doors and furniture.
The downgrade was also the reason for the hotel having so many rooms, apparently the hotel itself was a base feature of the dungeon and couldn’t be removed despite it shrinking in size each time. There had also been a hotel for each of the dungeon floors, which had been merged together with each downgrade.
Unfortunately this meant that his contribution points were not going to be of much use, anything cheap that the dungeon could made for him was only the resources that he could already gather himself, anything better was balanced for when the dungeon was a multi level monstrosity where the Loobins started at level thirty, meaning anything he could still buy was a little advanced for him and cost closer to the one hundred thousand mark. Ambrose could however spend his contribution on restoring or upgrading the wings of the hotel.
Dungeon contribution was a small portion of the mana that someone had earned for the dungeon, which it needed to survive. By spending the contribution the dungeon effectively gained that mana back but was forced to spend it, so he could really spend it on anything that cost that amount of mana to create or achieve. It was an odd system where the dungeon actually had a net gain of mana from its creatures being killed, though they would lose out on some of the mana that was stored in the objects created from the creatures until they decayed, returning to the dungeon over time. This meant that each of the Loobins that he harvested for meat was gaining mana for the dungeon equal to the cost of creating the creature plus a small amount for killing it as the creatures consciousness and power returned to the dungeon, but then losing the dungeon mana for the bits of the body that was removed, though in his case this would return several weeks to months after being eaten.
“The difference in mana is made up by several of the gods, acting as Sponsors for the dungeon much like your Sponsor does for you. All dungeons have the base Sponsors, but often gain additional ones based on their path. This dungeon used to have a crafting god as a Sponsor due to it being a large focus.”
“In return, the dungeon cores spread the system, handling notifications for an area. Additional Sponsors usually gain something similar by having their domain be a part of the dungeon, drawing more adventurers to that deity's path, where gains on that path provides the relevant god with power.”
“Wait, does that mean that the dungeon is the one that writes the weird system messages?” Ambrose asked as the pair travelled.
“They are not weird. But to answer your question, it largely depends. Some of your messages would be written by the dungeon, but many are just run through the dungeon as a relay and were written by the system at some point. Some of your messages may be references to another adventurer who received the Skill at some time before you.”
Ambrose squinted at Prism in suspicion, that certainly would explain why some of his messages were personalised.
“I would also like to thank you for killing the Ousted King, special creatures within the dungeon cost large amounts of mana to create and persisted through the downgrades, even when their vessels were weakened. Your efforts have bought the dungeon another decade at least."
Ambrose’s eyes filled with greed at the mention of more of the extremely valuable encounters, missing Prisms attempt at sincerity through the monotone lens she was forced to communicate through. Seeing this, Prism continued.
"I cannot point you in the direction of any of the others but can inform you of when there are none left. They also provide substantially more dungeon contribution points due to the mana invested and additional difficulty.”
Even through the monotone, once again disappointing a woman registered in Ambrose's mind as he put on a repented smile and tried to come of sincere. “I would be more than happy to assist you and the dungeon in this matter.”
Crossing the small river wasn’t an issue any longer, Ambrose found that as long as he wasn’t too weighed down, he could jump over the whole thing thanks to his larger Body Attributes, Running, and Jumping Skills. He then tied his rope to the crates, using that to drag his heavier objects through the water, not needing to worry about them getting wet as long as he dried them off so that he wouldn't be inviting rust.
The hotel wasn’t changed much, in fact the only difference that was noticeable, except for the Tailoring hall, was two doors. One was the main heavy door, which would keep monsters from wandering in, though wouldn’t keep out something like the Ousted King who had the intelligence to open a door. The second door was the one to the room he had awoken in, now almost completely filled with a bed made from softened Dungeonese Sheep wool resembling a large cloud or beanbag more than a bed. Ambrose sunk into it slightly as he continued his conversation with Prism, though pulled out his Sewing Skill book from his bag ready to read once Prism had shared all the information she could now that he had finished the first quest.
"Normally the requirement for passing the crafting trial, is to create an item from dungeon materials that reaches beyond its normal rank, and is of a base epic rarity. Because of the downgrade since the trial was last completed however, you only need to do so at rare rarity."
Ambrose's eyes widened in shock, he didn't even know how to create clothes yet, but would need to create an item of masterwork quality if he ever wanted to beat the dungeon. Even just at rare rank this was a huge ask, with it normally being easier to just create an item of the next rank up, provided you had materials that could handle it. Item rarity was largely determined by what went into an item, and what the item was, with the crafters actual skill at crafting only reducing it from there. This was why the Rage Bombs Ambrose had created were of uncommon rank despite his lack of skill, the item was simple and largely just made from high quality ingredients. To create an item at masterwork quality was immensely rare and required actual mastery over skill, ingredients, and item. Requiring one to gather the best quality ingredient at that rank, then refine it optimally for the project, before perfectly creating the item with the ideal techniques for its purposes. The result would have far greater effects and usually become a Magical tier item that wouldn't decay for thousands of years.
Ambrose almost reflexively gave up on beating the dungeon, but as he thought over what he had learned recently, mixed with his unique position for gaining new Skills, and learning them immensely fast it may be possible on a reasonable schedule. All he needed was to mix far more Skills together than one normally would, he already had access to alchemy aids and potions, there were several about improving aspects of items, he just needed to find the right ingredients.
With the difficulty pointed out, Ambrose moved on before his future plans distracted him too much from his present ones. Cracking open the first Skill book was a unique experience. Opening a new book was a favoured experience of Ambrose’s normally, the smell of a book was hard to be beat after all, but the Skill books was another step above. Not only did Ambrose get to enjoy the smell of fresh book, the magic having locked it in, but as he opened the book a slow stream of information began to flow into his mind. The initial pages of the book contained instructions on how to perform various stitches, and when they should be used.
Ambrose almost didn’t need to read the book, the Skill impartment was heavily aided by his increased Skill gains, filing the information into his head automatically. Of course this didn’t mean that Ambrose skipped out on the work, spending the remainder of his day reading a large portion of the book.
It was odd, without even touching upon his training materials or any of the tools in the Tailoring hall, Ambrose felt confident in his Sewing abilities. Not wanting to get too far into the book without actually testing the information, he pulled out some of the trash scraps of hide he had and he quizzed himself, going through each stitch the book had taught so far, finding that he not only had remembered all of them and their uses, but had managed to perform each to an acceptable quality first time.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Ambrose decided right then and there that he was going to get his hands on the other Skill books that Whesker had, and any others he could find. It didn’t even matter to him any more whether or not he could learn the main Skill like with the Fire Magic basics book that was the star of Whesker’s shop, the fact that he could learn the feeder Skills and gain such a heavy understanding of the basics just from reading for a few hours seemed insane, though when he checked on his gains from the session he realised why.
----------------------------------------
CONGRATULATIONS OUTWORLDER, YOU HAVE MANIFESTED NEW SKILLS
You have gained the Skill Studying at Level 4 (Uncommon): Knowledge is power.
* Increased rate of learning while using Studying Abilities.
* Increased retention of information while using Studying Abilities.
You have gained the Skill Sewing at Level 10 (Common): This way you can fix those pyjamas.
* Improved understanding of how to sew things together.
* Improved understanding of Sewing techniques.
By gaining these Skills you have gained the following Abilities.
* Create Thread (Sewing): Any quality crafter can create their own materials.
* Create Cloth (Sewing): You cannot create the best if you do not use the best. Which you might as well also create.
* Sew (Sewing): Make two into one.
* Study Theory (Studying): The beauty of book learning.
* Study Practical (Studying): Not all can be learned from reading, sometimes you must see and do to learn.
----------------------------------------
As far as Ambrose could tell, the Studying Skill was another increase to his Skill gains as long as he had something to learn from directly, whether that be person or book.
“If I can get Skill books for something survival related, my Character would also boost the experience again. Its entirely possible that I would be able to catch up and overtake my Small Blades Skill in a couple days of reading. This feels almost like an exploit, how do I make it worse.”
Ambrose wrote several more notes down, considering possible Skills that may further increase gains. “So the feeder Skills that keep getting mentioned likely increase the efficiency of the Skills once you evolve, otherwise why wouldn’t I just go straight into Tailoring, I am sure I could have unlocked the Skill without needing to Sew. Would that also mean that the theory Skills boost the learning of relevant Skills, I know there is one for magic but would there be others. What if I just go for a bunch of different crafting Skills, would I get some kind of crafting theory, or would that just work towards an omni crafting Skill instead. Maybe I can focus on using Abilities tied to a higher ranked Skill to boost the gains from the lower versions, like if I make a tapestry using the loom or just make a set of pyjamas, or would that mess things up giving me both Skills.
He looked over to Prism hopefully, but she chose not to assist him for now.
With no ideas that he could immediately test, and resolving to discuss it with the Enricks, Ambrose packed up and decided to head back to the tavern. While he wanted to test out the various tools he had gathered for Sewing and Tailoring, he didn’t want to stay the night in the dungeon without telling the family hosting him in advance. He had already seen that Mariella was worrying about him enough without him disappearing in the deadly dungeon that they couldn’t enter on threat of death.
The rest of Ambrose’s evening consisted of enjoying food and fervently consuming the knowledge in his other Skill books, not resisting and opening all of them, just to get an idea before he went back through the Sewing book to try and blast his way through it, only stopping when his lamp burned out leaving him in darkness. Even then he still continued his study, making a section of notes for each of the different Skill books, reducing what he read into a condensed pane of glass, he didn’t need light to see them after all, and believed that the effort would only work towards increasing his Studying Skill.
“Ambrose get up, the ships here. You should help out to make a good first impression.” Jobe pounded on the door shaking Ambrose from his slumber. Peering out the window it was still before first light, though judging from how tired he was, it shouldn’t be too far off.
Jobe had waited downstairs for Ambrose to come out, the two men wandered down to the docks once he did. As they headed off the two of them each carried one of the meat laden barrels with them. The silhouette of a small trading ship could be seen, a small army of torch flames lining the docks as the townsfolk fought to be first in helping them unload their goods, hoping to score something extra for their help, get the first shot at selling what they had, or buying the limited stock before anyone else had the chance.
Ambrose had only seen this many of the town out and about during the impromptu festival several days earlier, it felt almost eerie as they all crowded around the ship in the darkness, all helping unload barrels of alcohol, medical supplies, clothing, and more.
By the time the sun had arrived, Ambrose and the town had worked with the travelling traders, setting up a small set of market stalls along the docks. The night crew went off to the tavern to sleep as the day crew spilled out, some staying around the ship managing the various stalls, while others went to find a nice place to relax for their day on land before they had to continue on their journey.
Ambrose browsed the stalls as Jobe talked with one of the merchants he was familiar with. Most of the town's alcohol for the tavern, or personal supply, came through this and one other group of merchants. Ambrose and Jobe had agreed earlier that it was best if Jobe was the one selling off the meat, already in the good graces of the merchants after years of trading together, he would have an easier time selling the meat off, as well as get a better price for the goods due to his experience in Bartering, another Skill Ambrose added to his list of things to eventually do. Ambrose considered how much more he could have gotten off of Whesker if he had the Skill.
Hang on, I was awfully willing to just agree with Whesker’s understanding of the price. I didn't even consider getting a second opinion or that Skills might be involved. I need to get some Skills to block out stuff like that, it wasn’t emotional damage, or I should have been protected. It has to be something similar though, some charisma type thing that just makes people want to go with it. Oh well, he couldn’t and probably wouldn't have screwed me over too badly, I did walk away with over a thousand golds worth of stuff for a few gems after all.
Ambrose’s eyes narrowed in paranoia and suspicion as he considered that maybe he was dismissing the possibility of him being screwed over, because of some other Skill Whesker had as well dawned on him.
As the morning continued the town purchased many of the merchant's goods, not many were of interest to Ambrose. While he certainly wanted to have more clothes to his name, Jobe had yet to return with the coin to enable him to buy any, and most of the garments that would survive his rigorous use were gone by the time the large man returned.
In the end, Ambrose ended up with twenty four gold pieces from the trade, and ended up spending most of the money on several reams of cloth that the merchants had left on the ship, only intending to sell it at one of the towns that had Tailors. This way Ambrose had more materials to practise with and would be able to make his own clothes so he wasn’t stuck in the same single outfit that was growing ratty thanks to his multiple combat wounds, of course he needed to push through to Tailoring before he would risk ruining the nicer materials.
The merchants had also brought a message with them, with Renmark, the captain of the guard, ordering a gathering of the town to take place that evening at the tavern. When most of the town had arrived, with many of them enjoying the Loobin meat meals that had been prepared for the sailors to take part in, Renmark made the announcement.
“Good people of Baro, long have we waited for news from the kingdoms about the fate of our island. A message has been sent that the disputes over the true possession of Baro has been resolved, and that our kingdom of Ethria has proven that its claim was true thanks to an intervening Sponsored, and maintains ownership of the island. Thanks to this we are finally being sent a lord to take care of us, allowing for proper development and trade agreements to return once more.
It is my duty to inform you all that our new lord is to be Telpin Morncrest, son of Reywick Morncrest.”
Murmurs filled the town, some happy, others worried. Ambrose even saw money changing hands as bets made long ago were finally paid out.
“Lord Morncrest is set to arrive two weeks from now, with his official investiture to occur on the night of Full Moon's Bounty. That is all, please enjoy your evening. My thanks go out to our merchant friends for bringing this auspicious news and for their continued support of our little town.”
With the announcement out of the way, the night continued on. Ambrose getting to enjoy his second small celebration as the sailors and merchants enjoyed their night on land. The tone was far more reserved and nervous than the previous one however, the impending arrival of a new lord was apparently incredibly important.
A town lived and breathed by the will of its controlling lord or council, they were the ones who maintained and created trading agreements, officialised the buying and selling of land, controlled the laws, and many other things that simply couldn’t happen without them. Baro had been in a constant state of holding its breath and maintaining itself the best it could with what was already in place for the last several years since the passing of their last lord. This wasn’t holding well, old trade agreements had run their course and couldn’t be adjusted without a lord or appointed official, of which there wasn’t any, to approve the changes. This left only two infrequent merchant ships who maintained their old trade agreements, people also couldn’t legally move into the town either, and there was simply no reason to visit with the dungeon being barred off and information of it stifled for the last decade.
A new lord meant a possible resurgence of the town, but the appointment of a young lord could also be worrying, he was likely being sent out here for a Character growth opportunity, meaning they would operate the town in whatever manner would be best for himself, rather than what was best for the town, causing much of the town to worry about their way of life.
With no impending deadline over his head, Ambrose spent the next week enjoying himself, leaving his Sewing behind for the moment. He got to know more of the town as he began to develop his Skills, inquiring with those who had them about tips and tricks that they could offer, finding that he could trigger his Studying Skill during these conversations and by watching them work as long as he paid enough attention to what they were doing, even in the case of the blacksmith Torval, who had quickly told him to fuck off when he caught Ambrose spying on the man while working on some basic metal items.
He was still recovering from the damage he had incurred during his breakthrough for the entire week, so combat was off the menu. Which was what had led Ambrose to spend most of his time in the town, trying to improve his knowledge of how Skills worked, while slowly working through each of his Skill books. It turns out that he didn’t have to worry about unlocking Tailoring prematurely, he could choose to gain the Skill at any time but because he had a lower ranked version of the Skill it wouldn’t do so unless he desired it. Only if he turned his Sewing Skill into something other than Tailoring would he then unlock Tailoring automatically by making some form of clothing to a reasonably standard.
Ambrose was also able to work out more about what happened when you maxed out Skills. Essentially once you had a Skill at level one hundred you had the option to push it into becoming something new, getting one of potentially unlimited new Skills, though most had several known common versions. This was what became Skill Evolution, where you specialised a Skill into a certain form, the easiest example was the Cooking Skill which could be pushed into focusing on baking becoming the Baking skill that Berta the local baker had been nice enough to tell Ambrose about. Alternatively you could push it towards creating bulk amounts of hearty filling food, making it into Marcella’s Tavern Cooking. You could also do neither and simply prove it good enough to reach an uncommon rank.
Skill Evolution wasn’t the only option though, if you couldn’t or didn’t want to push a Skill to the next rarity you had the option to wait until you had multiple similar Skills and merge them together. This was called Skill Confluence and had been briefly mentioned by Prism. This was actually how you ended up with the Alchemy Skill, requiring you to have a bigger base for crafting than a single Skill allowed. This was what Whesker had meant by feeding the First aid and Cooking Skills to Alchemy. You needed to cover enough of the resulting Skill's scope to create it and bring it high enough. To be able to level Alchemy to level one hundred and push it into rare rarity, you needed to have sacrificed at least three different Skills into it, though you could do more to make Alchemy more powerful and help move it towards your true version.
A healing focused alchemist would likely focus on Potion Making, Herbalism, and First Aid as the Skills to create a version of Alchemy that focused on improving the healing effects of their creations. While a more general alchemist might just focus on the Skills that directly went into making alchemical creations so that they were better at creating anything that might be needed, from potions to poisons. The specialist alchemist would then have a better chance at evolving their Skill further, likely only requiring the addition of Healing magic to bring the Skill out of the Mundane tier and into Epic rank Magical Tier. The generalist, by keeping the scope of his alchemy Skill larger, simply requires more to be able keep up, likely needing to feed multiple magic Skills in order to get it over the line, though a Mundane version of the Skill was still possible, it just wasn’t a route most people went. Ambrose wouldn’t have the choice.
All the additional complexity and possibilities of Skills made Ambrose’s mind spin with ideas for several days, constantly weighing the costs and benefits of each possible choice as he pushed his crafting Skills forward, quickly rushing forward towards his first choice.